Please don’t rush to judgment on Boys & Girls Clubs

Please don’t rush to judgment on Boys & Girls Clubs

We’re writing to respond to Tracy Collins Sklar’s letter to The Acorn on Dec. 11 about the Boys & Girls Clubs and Oak Park. Ms. Sklar is objecting to the fact that we regularly talk about our plan to build six Boys & Girls Clubs in this region, which includes Thousand Oaks, Calabasas, Agoura Hills, Westlake Village, Hidden Hills and Oak Park. She wishes we wouldn’t mention Oak Park.

Our organization, The Boys & Girls Clubs of Conejo & Las Virgenes, is raising a total of $12 million to build six clubs in the area. The clubs, each of which costs over $1 million to construct, are designed to provide the kids their own place, with the professional leadership of trained youth leaders and a wide range of nationally proven programs. Kids use their own card key to check in and then have access to a state-of-the-art computer lab, a crafts room, sports, health and fitness activities, and much more. Ask any kid who is a member of a Boys & Girls Club: they’re also just pure fun.

The clubs will be serving only the kids in each neighborhood and are frequently going to be built on middle school campuses—which makes the kids’ participation easy for them and attractive to the schools. We make the clubs available to the schools for their own use during the school day in a joint use agreement that benefits the whole community. The clubs are built by donations from individuals, small and large businesses, and in some cases, as in Thousand Oaks, city participation.

The Boys & Girls Clubs have built a reputation over the last century for doing incredible things for kids and some people associate that success with inner city teenagers or tough situations. But the clubs are equally successful with affluent kids who still want to spend time with other kids. Our programs teach leadership, character and citizenship, along with providing socialization and other activities.

Did you know that the chairmen of Starbucks, General Motors and Blockbuster Entertainment all have one thing in common? They’re alumni of Boys & Girls Clubs.

So are Dan Rather, Bill Cosby, George Lucas and Robin Williams. There are extremely successful Boys & Girls Clubs in Malibu, Newport Beach, Laguna Beach, Scottsdale, Ariz., and other mid-to-high-income areas around the country.

The Boys & Girls Clubs are completely nonprofit and are here because hundreds and hundreds of people in our community are willing to give their own hard-earned money to make sure the kids have a neighborhood club of their own.

Our first club, a beautiful, brand-new 10,000 sq.ft. facility, is opening in January at Los Cerritos Middle School in Thousand Oaks. We’d like to invite Ms. Sklar and her colleagues to come to lunch there with us, take a tour and see for themselves what the clubs are doing, and why.

Cal Johnston, Chairman

Ronnie Hewett, President

and CEO, Boys & Girls Clubs

of Conejo & Las Virgenes